DOCSLIB.ORG

The Success Story of a Misnomer

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
The Success Story of a Misnomer OFFSCREEN :: Vol. 11, Nos. 8-9, Aug/Sept 2007 Discourses on Diegesis The Success Story of a Misnomer By Henry M. Taylor Diegesis refers to narration, the content of the narrative, the fictional world as described inside the story. In film it refers to all that is really going on on-screen, that is, to fictional reality. - Susan Hayward Diegesis, and its various adjectival forms, diegetic, non-diegetic, meta- diegetic, homo-diegetic etc., have long functioned in literary and film studies as fetish or code words separating the cognoscenti of these disciplines from the general, "ignorant" public. To those on the outside, these terms must sound like cryptic jargon, a situation somewhat reminiscent of the mid-80s, when only the initiated knew what the acronym MS-DOS stood for. Yet it may come as something of a surprise that the highly successful term diegetic is really a misnomer. In the third book of The Republic (Politeia), Plato distinguishes between two kinds of narrative: the simple narrative (haple diegesis), featuring a narrator speaking directly in his own, undisguised voice, and mimesis, or imitative 1 of 5 OFFSCREEN :: Vol. 11, Nos. 8-9, Aug/Sept 2007 representation, in which the author speaks indirectly, i.e. through other characters. Plato is critical of imitation as imitation, regarding it as dangerous since it simply copies the appearance of the real, providing us only with reproductions of shadows; hence mimesis is an inferior, degraded form of storytelling. This is, of course, ironic, as Plato himself in his dialogues does not speak to us directly, but through the voice of Socrates. All this changes with Plato's pupil Aristotle, who, in his Poetics, recontextualizes and expands the significance of mimesis and mimetic narrative. Mimesis now does not reproduce reproductions (or shadows), but reality itself, and hence it is a first and not second order imitation. Reading Aristotle with Paul Ricœur (in the latter's Time and Narrative), we could say that any kind of creation of poetic worlds is mimetic. Aristotle still adheres to Plato's term diegesis, but reassigns it to the mode of mimesis: hence, while all narrative is mimesis in the wider sense, the simple or direct narrative (as in voice-over narration in film) is diegetic mimesis, whereas dramatic representations (of actors in a scene, for instance) are, strictly speaking, mimetic mimesis. Therefore, mimesis in Aristotle is the umbrella term designating all poetic representation. Alas, for a variety of reasons, what should have been called mimesis and mimetic came to be designated by the terms diegesis and diegetic. In film studies, before the academic discipline was established as such, the French term diégèse was introduced around 1950 by Etienne and Anne Souriau, even if there is some dispute about its precise origin. According to Gérard Genette, it was Etienne 2 of 5 OFFSCREEN :: Vol. 11, Nos. 8-9, Aug/Sept 2007 Souriau who first used the term in 1948; whereas Anne Souriau claims in the Vocabulaire d'esthétique to have coined it herself in 1950; and David Bordwell in his Narration in the Fiction Film refers to Etienne Souriau's introduction of the concept in a widely known 1953 publication, which is presumably appropriate regarding the expression's historical reception. This dispute notwithstanding, the English terms diegesis and diegetic, referring to the spatial story worlds primarily of fictional texts/films, are translations of the French words diégèse and diégétique — the matter being complicated by the fact that Genette (aligning himself with Etienne Souriau) asserts that these terms are not derived from the Greek diegesis. Of course, by now this terminology has been so well established that it would be futile not to use it in its accustomed sense. It has been particularly useful in designating aspects and features of filmic sound as it relates to the relatively closed story-worlds of fiction (regarding non-fiction, and the documentary in particular, the terms remain somewhat problematic). A variant that I first heard of in the early 90s, and that may have been coined at Zurich University's film studies department, is the expression transdiegetic, referring to sound's propensities to cross the border of the diegetic to the non-diegetic and remaining unspecific. A good example can be found in Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse Now (USA 1979): when the PT boat crew member played by Laurence Fishburne turns up the radio playing the Stones song "Satisfaction," the music (at first simply located in on-screen space) swells, thereby encompassing on- and off-screen space; a similar 3 of 5 OFFSCREEN :: Vol. 11, Nos. 8-9, Aug/Sept 2007 phenomenon can be observed in Kenneth Branagh's Henry V (UK 1989), when, after the victorious battle at Agincourt, one of the English soldiers (played by the film's composer, Patrick Doyle) starts singing "Non Nobis," before the rousing chant is picked up by what is in effect a phantom choir and orchestra on the soundtrack. The term transdiegetic, therefore, reveals that filmic sound, unlike the image, is not place-specific and delimitated, and acts not solely to weld the images together (across shot edits), but also to engulf the spectator in the filmic experience. Plato would not have approved. ____________ Sources Cited: Aristotle. (1997). Poetics (Malcolm Heath, Trans). Penguin Classics ed. Reprint. London: Penguin. Bordwell, David. (1985). Narration in the Fiction Film. Madison, Wisconsin: University of Wisconsin Press. Genette, Gérard. (1988). Narrative Discourse Revisited (Jane E. Lewin, Trans). Ithaca, N. Y.: Cornell University Press. – Originally published as: Nouveau discours du récit. Paris: Seuil, 1983. Hayward, Susan. (1996). Key concepts in cinema studies. London: Routledge. Plato. (1996). The Republic (Richard W. Sterling and William C. Scott, Trans.). Norton paperback ed. New York: Norton. – This ed. first published: 1985. Ricœur, Paul. (1990). Time and Narrative, vol. 1 (Kathleen McLaughlin and David Pellauer, Trans.). Paperback ed. Reprint. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. – Previously published: 1984. Originally published as: Temps et récit, tome 1. Paris: Seuil, 1983. 4 of 5 OFFSCREEN :: Vol. 11, Nos. 8-9, Aug/Sept 2007 Souriau, Etienne. (1990). Vocabulaire d'esthétique. Publié sous la direction de Anne Souriau. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France. __________ Bio: Henry M. Taylor (*1965), Dr.phil., Research Fellow in Film Studies at the University of Zurich. He is the author of a book on biographical films (Rolle des Lebens. Die Filmbiographie als narratives System, Marburg: Schueren Verlag, 2002), and on Franco-Argentinian filmmaker Edgardo Cozarinsky (Der Krieg eines Einzelnen. Eine filmische Auseinandersetzung mit der Geschichte, Zurich: Chronos Verlag, 1995). Numerous lectures at the Universities of Konstanz (Germany), Zurich, and Lucerne (Switzerland). His current research deals with conspiracy culture and the paranoid thriller in film and television. 5 of 5 .
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Philosophy, Theory, and Literature
    STANFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS PHILOSOPHY, THEORY, AND LITERATURE 20% DISCOUNT NEW & FORTHCOMING ON ALL TITLES 2019 TABLE OF CONTENTS Redwood Press .............................2 Square One: First-Order Questions in the Humanities ................... 2-3 Currencies: New Thinking for Financial Times ...............3-4 Post*45 ..........................................5-7 Philosophy and Social Theory ..........................7-10 Meridian: Crossing Aesthetics ............10-12 Cultural Memory in the Present ......................... 12-14 Literature and Literary Studies .................... 14-18 This Atom Bomb in Me Ordinary Unhappiness Shakesplish The Long Public Life of a History in Financial Times Asian and Asian Lindsey A. Freeman The Therapeutic Fiction of How We Read Short Private Poem Amin Samman American Literature .................19 David Foster Wallace Shakespeare’s Language Reading and Remembering This Atom Bomb in Me traces what Critical theorists of economy tend Thomas Wyatt Digital Publishing Initiative ....19 it felt like to grow up suffused with Jon Baskin Paula Blank to understand the history of market American nuclear culture in and In recent years, the American fiction Shakespeare may have written in Peter Murphy society as a succession of distinct around the atomic city of Oak Ridge, writer David Foster Wallace has Elizabethan English, but when Thomas Wyatt didn’t publish “They stages. This vision of history rests on ORDERING Tennessee. As a secret city during been treated as a symbol, an icon, we read him, we can’t help but Flee from Me.” It was written in a a chronological conception of time Use code S19PHIL to receive a the Manhattan Project, Oak Ridge and even a film character. Ordinary understand his words, metaphors, notebook, maybe abroad, maybe whereby each present slips into the 20% discount on all books listed enriched the uranium that powered Unhappiness returns us to the reason and syntax in relation to our own.
    [Show full text]
  • Fictionality
    COPYRIGHT NOTICE: Edited by Franco Moretti: The Novel, Volume 1 is published by Princeton University Press and copyrighted, © 2006, by Princeton University Press. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form by any electronic or mechanical means (including photocopying, recording, or information storage and retrieval) without permission in writing from the publisher, except for reading and browsing via the World Wide Web. Users are not permitted to mount this file on any network servers. Follow links for Class Use and other Permissions. For more information send email to: [email protected] CATHERINE GALLAGHER The Rise of Fictionality No feature of the novel seems to be more obvious and yet more easily ig­ nored than its fictionality. Like prose, fictional is one of those definitive terms (“a novel is a long, fictional prose narrative”) that most historians of the form have tacitly agreed to leave unexamined; we tend to let it lie dormant in our critical analyses as well. And yet we all know that it is active and de­ termining in our culture, for we cannot walk into a bookstore or read the Sunday papers without noticing that the primary categorical division in our textual universe is between “fiction” and “nonfiction.” Perhaps we imagine that a distinction so pervasive and secure can get along without our help, that it would be redundant to define such a self-evident trait. Or, perhaps we find that the theories of fictionality debated by philosophers and narratolo­ gists finally tell us too little about either the history or the specific properties of the novel to repay the difficulty of mastering them.
    [Show full text]
  • Narrowing the Gap Between Imaginary and Real Artifacts: a Process for Making and Filming Diegetic Prototypes
    Virginia Commonwealth University VCU Scholars Compass Theses and Dissertations Graduate School 2013 Narrowing the Gap Between Imaginary and Real Artifacts: A Process for Making and Filming Diegetic Prototypes Al Hussein Wanas Virginia Commonwealth University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/etd Part of the Art and Design Commons © The Author Downloaded from https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/etd/3142 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at VCU Scholars Compass. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of VCU Scholars Compass. For more information, please contact [email protected]. © Al Hussein Wanas 2013 All Rights Reserved 2 Approval certificate for Al Hussein Wanas for the thesis project entitled Narrowing The Gap Between Imaginary And Real Artifacts: A Process For Making And Filming Diegetic Prototypes. Submitted to the faculty of the Master of Fine Arts in Design Studies of Virginia Commonwealth University in Qatar in partial fulfillment for the degree, Master of Fine Arts in Design Studies. Al Hussein Wanas, BFA In Graphic Design, Virginia Commonwealth University in Qatar, Doha Qatar, May 2011. Virginia Commonwealth University in Qatar, Doha Qatar, May 2013 Diane Derr ______________________ Primary Advisor, Assistant Professor Master of Fine Arts in Design Studies Patty Paine ______________________ Secondary Advisor, Reader, Assistant Professor Liberal Arts and Science Levi Hammett ______________________ Secondary
    [Show full text]
  • A Literature Review and Analysis of Mode Deactivation Therapy
    IJBCT Volume 6, No. 4 A Literature Review and Analysis of Mode Deactivation Therapy Jack A. Apsche Abstract This article is a review of articles, chapters and current research examining Mode Deactivation Therapy. Current applications of MDT suggest that mindfulness is a core component of MDT, as well as acceptance, defusion and validation, clarification and redirection of the functional alternative beliefs. These components are the core of MDT and a recent study has evaluated each of them as to how it affects the target or outcome goals. The evolution of MDT is reviewed from case studies to a mediation and meta-analysis. The purpose of this article is to review the foundation of MDT and current articles that elucidate the efficaciousness of MDT as an evidenced – based methodology. Keywords: Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT), Mode Deactivation Therapy (MDT),Post traumatic Stress Disorder ( PTSD), Mediation analysis, Mindfulness, Meta analysis, Physical aggression, Sexual aggression. Introduction In the process of treatment research trials and development of MDT, this methodology (MDT) has been compared to the alternative methodologies such as: Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT), Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) and Social Skills Training. This review examines the literature of MDT in treating adolescent clients with reactive emotional dysregulation, who presented with behaviors including parasuicidal acts, verbal and physical aggression and sexually aberrant behavior. Case studies in this article involved clients with complicated histories of sexual, physical, or emotional abuse, as well as neglect and multi-axial diagnoses. Data indicates that MDT is effective in reducing the rate of physical and sexual aggression in addition to symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
    [Show full text]
  • The Effects of Diegetic and Nondiegetic Music on Viewers’ Interpretations of a Film Scene
    Loyola University Chicago Loyola eCommons Psychology: Faculty Publications and Other Works Faculty Publications 6-2017 The Effects of Diegetic and Nondiegetic Music on Viewers’ Interpretations of a Film Scene Elizabeth M. Wakefield Loyola University Chicago, [email protected] Siu-Lan Tan Kalamazoo College Matthew P. Spackman Brigham Young University Follow this and additional works at: https://ecommons.luc.edu/psychology_facpubs Part of the Musicology Commons, and the Psychology Commons Recommended Citation Wakefield, Elizabeth M.; an,T Siu-Lan; and Spackman, Matthew P.. The Effects of Diegetic and Nondiegetic Music on Viewers’ Interpretations of a Film Scene. Music Perception: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 34, 5: 605-623, 2017. Retrieved from Loyola eCommons, Psychology: Faculty Publications and Other Works, http://dx.doi.org/10.1525/mp.2017.34.5.605 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Faculty Publications at Loyola eCommons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Psychology: Faculty Publications and Other Works by an authorized administrator of Loyola eCommons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License. © The Regents of the University of California 2017 Effects of Diegetic and Nondiegetic Music 605 THE EFFECTS OF DIEGETIC AND NONDIEGETIC MUSIC ON VIEWERS’ INTERPRETATIONS OF A FILM SCENE SIU-LAN TAN supposed or proposed by the film’s fiction’’ (Souriau, Kalamazoo College as cited by Gorbman, 1987, p. 21). Film music is often described with respect to its relation to this fictional MATTHEW P. S PACKMAN universe. Diegetic music is ‘‘produced within the implied Brigham Young University world of the film’’ (Kassabian, 2001, p.
    [Show full text]
  • The Marriage of Mimesis and Diegesis in "White Teeth"
    University of New Mexico UNM Digital Repository 2019 Award Winners - Hulsman Undergraduate Jim & Mary Lois Hulsman Undergraduate Library Library Research Award Research Award Spring 2019 The aM rriage of Mimesis and Diegesis in "White Teeth" Brittany R. Raymond University of New Mexico, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalrepository.unm.edu/ugresearchaward_2019 Part of the Literature in English, British Isles Commons, and the Other English Language and Literature Commons Recommended Citation Raymond, Brittany R.. "The aM rriage of Mimesis and Diegesis in "White Teeth"." (2019). https://digitalrepository.unm.edu/ ugresearchaward_2019/5 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Jim & Mary Lois Hulsman Undergraduate Library Research Award at UNM Digital Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in 2019 Award Winners - Hulsman Undergraduate Library Research Award by an authorized administrator of UNM Digital Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Raymond 1 Brittany Raymond Professor Woodward ENGL 250 28 April 2018 The Marriage of Mimesis and Diegesis in White Teeth Zadie Smith’s literary masterpiece, White Teeth, employs a yin-yang relationship between Mimesis and Diegesis, shifting the style of narration as Smith skillfully maneuvers between the past and present. As the novel is unfolding, two distinctive writing styles complement each other; we are given both brief summaries and long play-by-play descriptions of the plot, depending on the scene. Especially as the story reaches its climax with Irie, Magid and Millat, Smith begins to interchange the styles more frequently, weaving them together in the same scenes. These two literary styles are grounded in Structuralist theory, which focuses on the function of the language itself.
    [Show full text]
  • Mathm 1431546286.Pdf
    Abstract Tellings is an art exhibition that interprets the impermanent state of storytelling through visual art, narrative, space, and objects. Exhibited in the Stamps School of At & Design’s Slusser Gallery, this MFA thesis project places the viewer in the delicate position between the world of things and the imagined spaces of folklore and fables. Sculptures, installations, and narratives draw on folklore, mythologies and personal memories, to obscure the role of storyteller and leave the audience to build their own narratives. The work deconstructs the narratives/fables into key moments, translating them into viewer experiences in visual storytelling. This MFA thesis explores the relationships of these elements and will illuminate their role in conjuring the exhibition, Tellings. Keywords Folklore, memory, mythology, narrative, nostalgia, objects, storytelling ! 2! ! 3! Contents The Story Is: The Structure of Story and Space The Rock Is a Rock, The Book is Being a Book: Material Power Building an Island: Access Through Space Painting Around the Holes: Narrative Transformation Conclusion Exhibition Index Bibliography ! 4! The Story Is: The Structure of Story and Space Story is more than a narrative. Within this document and within my work I use the term story often. To begin with clarity I attempt to use them as the following. Narrative is the tale: a collection of characters, setting and details sewn together within a plot. They are the written fables that pair each installation. Story is greater. Story includes the narrative, but also the visceral reactions to those narratives, the collective conjuring of imagined realities, and the emotional ties to personal experience and memory.
    [Show full text]
  • Introduction to the Paratext Author(S): Gérard Genette and Marie Maclean Source: New Literary History, Vol
    Introduction to the Paratext Author(s): Gérard Genette and Marie Maclean Source: New Literary History, Vol. 22, No. 2, Probings: Art, Criticism, Genre (Spring, 1991), pp. 261-272 Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/469037 Accessed: 11-01-2019 17:12 UTC JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at https://about.jstor.org/terms The Johns Hopkins University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to New Literary History This content downloaded from 128.227.202.135 on Fri, 11 Jan 2019 17:12:58 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Introduction to the Paratext* Gerard Genette HE LITERARY WORK consists, exhaustively or essentially, of a text, that is to say (a very minimal definition) in a more or less lengthy sequence of verbal utterances more or less con- taining meaning. But this text rarely appears in its naked state, without the reinforcement and accompaniment of a certain number of productions, themselves verbal or not, like an author's name, a title, a preface, illustrations. One does not always know if one should consider that they belong to the text or not, but in any case they surround it and prolong it, precisely in order to present it, in the usual sense of this verb, but also in its strongest meaning: to make it present, to assure its presence in the world, its "reception" and its consumption, in the form, nowadays at least, of a book.
    [Show full text]
  • Rethinking Mimesis
    Rethinking Mimesis Rethinking Mimesis: Concepts and Practices of Literary Representation Edited by Saija Isomaa, Sari Kivistö, Pirjo Lyytikäinen, Sanna Nyqvist, Merja Polvinen and Riikka Rossi Rethinking Mimesis: Concepts and Practices of Literary Representation, Edited by Saija Isomaa, Sari Kivistö, Pirjo Lyytikäinen, Sanna Nyqvist, Merja Polvinen and Riikka Rossi Layout: Jari Käkelä This book first published 2012 Cambridge Scholars Publishing 12 Back Chapman Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2XX, UK British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Copyright © 2012 by Saija Isomaa, Sari Kivistö, Pirjo Lyytikäinen, Sanna Nyqvist, Merja Polvinen and Riikka Rossi and contributors All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. ISBN (10): 1-4438-3901-9, ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-3901-3 Table of ConTenTs Introduction: Rethinking Mimesis The Editors...........................................................................................vii I Concepts of Mimesis Aristotelian Mimesis between Theory and Practice Stephen Halliwell....................................................................................3 Rethinking Aristotle’s poiêtikê technê Humberto Brito.....................................................................................25 Paul Ricœur and
    [Show full text]
  • Mimesis, Duality, and Rhetorical Education.” Rhetoric Society Quarterly 41.4 (2011): 295-315
    Terrill, Robert E. “Mimesis, Duality, and Rhetorical Education.” Rhetoric Society Quarterly 41.4 (2011): 295-315. Rhetoric Society Quarterly Vol. 41, No. 4, pp. 295–315 Mimesis, Duality, and Rhetorical Education Robert Terrill The pedagogical strategy of imitatio cultivates particular attitudes and habits that are useful resources for democratic citizens. Specifically, a mimetic pedagogy cultivates duality, as manifest in a faculty of perspective taking and enabled through the close analysis of rhetorical texts. Reviving imitatio as the central component of a rhetorical education entails a productive critique of norms of sincerity that prevail in contemporary culture, and as such constitutes one of the more significant contributions that rhetorical education can make toward enhancing and sustaining democratic culture. Scholars from disparate disciplines have recognized that a reinvigorated rhetorical education might contribute to the training of critically engaged citizens well-suited to a diverse democratic culture. Bryan Garsten, for example, has suggested that training in rhetoric is essential to cultivating a ‘‘capacity for practical judgment,’’ and that living in a culture that disparages rhetoric has crippled our political cul- ture by leaving us without the skills necessary to bring our lived experiences to bear ‘‘on a particular case in a way that yields a decision’’ (174–175). Danielle Allen has argued that it is ‘‘time to turn to the imperfect ideals for trust pro- duction crafted in the rhetorical tradition’’ (140–141), and thus to rediscover tac- tics for repairing some of the fissures that characterize contemporary public culture, particularly but not exclusively with regards to race. And Elizabeth Markovits proposes a program of ‘‘rhetorical literacy,’’ analogous to the enduring calls for media literacy but with the far more vital potential to restore our ability to ‘‘talk and listen to one another in our own democracy’’ (Markovits 174).
    [Show full text]
  • On the Epistemology of Narrative Theory : Narratology and Other Theories of Fictional Narrative Sylvie Patron
    On the Epistemology of Narrative Theory : Narratology and Other Theories of Fictional Narrative Sylvie Patron To cite this version: Sylvie Patron. On the Epistemology of Narrative Theory : Narratology and Other Theories of Fictional Narrative. Robert Kawashima, Gilles Philippe et Thelma Sowley. Phantom Sentences. Essays in Linguistics and Literature presented to Ann Banfield, Berne, Peter Lang, pp. 43-65, 2008. hal- 00698699v2 HAL Id: hal-00698699 https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-00698699v2 Submitted on 28 Mar 2013 HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access L’archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est archive for the deposit and dissemination of sci- destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents entific research documents, whether they are pub- scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, lished or not. The documents may come from émanant des établissements d’enseignement et de teaching and research institutions in France or recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires abroad, or from public or private research centers. publics ou privés. On the Epistemology of Narrative Theory: Narratology and Other Theories of Fictional Narrative Sylvie Patron University of Paris 7-Denis Diderot (Translated by Anne Marsella) Introduction The work of Gérard Genette in the field referred to as “narratology”2 represents one of the most important contributions to narrative theory, considered as a branch of literary theory, in the second half of the twentieth century. I purposely say “one of the most important”, as there are other theoretical contributions, some of which I believe to be equally important though they are not as well known as Genette’s narratology, particularly in France.3 These lesser-known theories are rich in epis- temological reflection.
    [Show full text]
  • “Immersion and Defamiliarization: Experiencing Literature and World
    This is the accepted version of the following article: Anderson, M., & Iversen, S. (2018). Immersion and defamiliarization: experiencing literature and world. Poetics Today, 39(3), 569-95, which has been published in final form at: https://doi.org/10.1215/03335372-7032760 “Immersion and Defamiliarization: Experiencing Literature and World” By Miranda Anderson and Stefan Iversen Final draft submitted for the Poetics Today issue Unnatural and Cognitive Perspectives on Literary Studies: A Theory Crossover Introduction1 Analysis of narrative fiction’s capacity to induce immersion and defamiliarization has a long history in the fields of literary and aesthetic theory. Most theoretical treatments of the two concepts give privilege and normative impetus to one type of response or related type of text. In this article we set out to rethink the concepts of immersion and defamiliarization by bringing them into dialogue. This dialogue involves an investigation of overlaps and differences between two theoretical paradigms, cognitive narratology and unnatural narratology. Our aim is to track evidence of, and to advance, understandings of the forms and functions of immersion and defamiliarization, which have been inspired by cognitive and unnatural approaches to narratology. Where these concepts have been associated with dualistic notions of cognition and purely mimetic notions of narrative, immersion and defamiliarization have come to seem in opposition in a way that we are seeking to show is too simplistic. The three literary texts, which provide
    [Show full text]